Cryptocurrency mining giant Bitmain and major crypto exchange Huobi have reportedly confirmed plans to lay off staff amid the 2018 price rout of the crypto markets. Hong Kong English-language newspaper South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported on the layoffs on Dec. 26. Beijing-based Bitmain Technology, which has dominated the mining hardware manufacturing horizon this year, is quoted by SCMP as saying in a statement that it is undergoing “some adjustment to our staff this year” — a statement reportedly prompted by Chinese social media coverage of looming layoffs at the firm. Bitmain reportedly stated: “A part of [building a sustainable …

Cryptocurrency mining giant Bitmain has reportedly fired its entire staff of Bitcoin Cash (BCH) developers, Blockstream CSO Samson Mow reported, citing Chinese social media sources on Dec. 23. The second in what appears to be a phase of staff losses for Bitmain, around 50 workers are reportedly set to go this week. The messages follow reports on China’s version of LinkedIn warning about a giant wave of redundancies targeting as much as half of Bitmain’s 2,500-strong workforce, with rumors now circling on Twitter after being uploaded by Primitive founding partner and commentator Dovey Wan. According to Wan, such social media …

Hong Kong’s stock market regulator is reportedly reluctant to allow Bitcoin mining equipment manufacturer Bitmain to conduct an initial public offering (IPO) in the city. Local English-language newspaper South China Morning Post (SCMP) made this claim in an article published Dec. 19, with reference to anonymous sources. Citing two “sources familiar with the matter,” SCMP poured more cold water on the plans of mining giant Bitmain to go public, just a day after the Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKEX) told Cointelegraph that any reports of hesitation on the part of the company were “rumors.” According to the publication’s sources, Hong …

A Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKEX) spokesperson has called Bitmain’s alleged hesitation around a purported initial public offering (IPO) “rumors,” in an email to Cointelegraph Dec. 17. When asked for verification and details on the crypto mining firm’s IPO status, the spokesperson responded that “HKEX does not comment on rumors.” Blockchain and crypto media had previously reported that the exchange was “hesitant” to host its IPO because of market conditions surrounding the overall crypto mining business. Anonymous sources have reportedly claimed that “the exchange is very hesitant to actually approve these Bitcoin (BTC) mining companies because the industry is so …

Amid the cryptocurrency market crash, even the newest crypto mining machines are struggling to seal profits for their operators, according to real-time data published by mining profitability data site ASICMinerValue.com (AMV) today, Dec. 11. AMV is a site that calculates real-time profitability rates for “ASIC” miners, hardware that uses Application-Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) chips, tailored to efficiently mine cryptocurrency based on a specific hashing algorithm. Updated every minute, the site calculates profit yields for specific miners based on current power costs, network difficulty, block rewards, and cryptocurrency prices. As of press time, the site indicates that among ASIC mining machines …

Chinese crypto mining giant Bitmain is closing its development center in Israel and firing local employees, Israeli business news outlet Globes has learned Monday, Dec. 10. Bitmaintech Israel — founded in 2016 to explore the use of blockchain technology, work on the Connect BTC mining pool, and develop the infrastructure behind Bitmain’s artificial intelligence (AI) project Sophon — will close this week. All 23 employees will be fired, the Globes reports. Gadi Glikberg, head of the Israeli branch as well as Bitmain vice president of international sales and marketing, is also leaving. Globes reports that Glikberg linked the closure to …

Florida-based United American Corp. (UnitedCorp) has purportedly filed a lawsuit against Bitmain, Bitcoin.com, Roger Ver, and the Kraken Bitcoin Exchange, according to a press release published Dec. 6. UnitedCorp alleges that the defendants planned a scheme to take control of the Bitcoin Cash (BCH) network. Founded in 1992, UnitedCorp is a development and management firm with a focus on telecommunications and information technologies. The company manages a portfolio of patents and proprietary technology in telecoms, social media and blockchain. UnitedCorp also owns and operates BlockchainDomes stations, that provide heat for agricultural applications. The suit filed in the U.S. District Court …

Coming every Sunday, the Hodler’s Digest will help you to track every single important news story that happened this week. The best (and worst) quotes, adoption and regulation highlights, leading coins, predictions, and much more — a week on Cointelegraph in one link. Top Stories This Week Nasdaq Notes Bitcoin Futures Could Launch in Quarter 1 2019, Bloomberg Reports Major U.S. stock exchange Nasdaq still intends to launch Bitcoin futures, and may do so in the first quarter of 2019, according to “two people familiar with the matter.” Speaking to Bloomberg this week, the two unnamed sources note that Nasdaq …

Chinese cryptocurrency mining giant Bitmain released several price indices Nov. 30, aiming to track the largest assets for both institutional and retail investors. The Bitmain Crypto Index (BCI) comprises real-time spot price reading which refreshes every second, along with a daily reference price. The spot index covers the 17 largest cryptocurrencies by market cap. In a methodology overview, Bitmain said the product was “developed to provide institutional and retail investors with a transparent, timely, methodology-based, and investable benchmark of the most active cryptocurrencies traded globally,” explaining: “The Index is solely owned by Bitmaintech Pte. Ltd. and is administered by Bitmain …

Crypto mining giant Bitmain is facing a class action lawsuit of $5 million that alleges it mined cryptocurrency for its own benefit on its customers’ devices. The filings were published under docket listings for the North District Court of California, Nov. 19. The lead plaintiff, Los Angeles County resident Gor Gevorkyan, has leveled his lawsuit against Bitmain’s U.S.- and China-based entities, alleging that the company is benefiting — without authorization — from the lengthy “initialization” period that its ASIC [Application-Specific Integrated Circuit] devices need for set up: “Until the complicated and time-consuming initialization procedures are completed, Bitmain’s ASIC [Application-Specific Integrated …

A year long bear crypto market appears to have had a negative impact on the profitability of cryptocurrency mining. In spite of this, Bitcoin miners still managed to generate $4.7 billion in profit in the first six months of 2018. Constantly growing competition between big mining pools and the increasing difficulty of Bitcoin’s algorithm make getting the first cryptocurrency less profitable and weight the scales against small players. Miners shut off their machines, and card manufacturers suffer losses. In particular, AMD representatives, whose last quarter fiscal report, published on Oct. 24, demonstrated that revenues from the sale of mining Graphics …

Bitmain co-founder Jihan Wu is reportedly no longer able to influence corporate decisions at the mining firm, Chinese industry media outlet Sanyan Blockchain reported Nov. 13. Citing an unnamed “financial news” source, Sanyan quotes a lawyer for Bitmain, Tian Yangang, saying that as a result of the redistribution of positions at the company’s executive board, Wu had been demoted from being a “director” to a “supervisor.” “After changing to a supervisor, there are no voting rights, so [Wu’s] power is smaller and [he] cannot participate in the business decision-making of the enterprise,” a rough translation of his comments reads. The …